The Timothée Chalamet-led Wonka sweetened up the pre-Christmas box office in singing to a $39 million domestic debut, ahead of expectations and a promising sign for the yuletide season.
Overseas, it took in $53.6 million from 77 markets to come in well ahead of family classics like Paddington or musicals like The Greatest Showman and Mary Poppins Returns. The movie’s global weekend haul of $92.6 million pushes the film’s early worldwide total to $151.4 million, including a foreign tally of $112.4 million. (It opened early in England and Australia, along with a handful of other markets.)
That’s a promising start for a musical, a genre that has struggled in recent times. From Warner Bros. and Harry Potter franchise producer David Heyman, Wonka is a whimsical origin tale about the magical candyman Willy Wonka, who was played by Gene Wilder in the classic movie Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.
Audiences bestowed Wonka with an A- CinemaScore, while 60 percent of ticket buyers were between the ages of 18 and 34. The largest quad was 18 to 24 at 33 percent, while another 10 percent of ticket buyers were between 13 and 17, underscoring Chalamet’s star status with younger moviegoers. Wonka is skewing slightly female so far, or 54 percent. (Femmes under age 18 gave the film an A+.)
Directed by Paul King of Paddington fame and starring Chalamet as a young Willy Wonka, the movie features a star-studded ensemble cast also including Hugh Grant, Olivia Colman, Keegan-Michael Key, Calah Lane, Paterson Joseph, Matt Lucas, Mathew Baynton, Sally Hawkins, Rowan Atkinson, Natasha Rothwell, Rich Fulcher, Rakhee Thakrar, Tom Davis and Kobna Holdbrook-Smith.
Wonka hopes to sing loudly throughout the holidays. This weekend always poses a challenge for moviegoing in that many consumers are occupied with gift-buying and other preparations, but traffic at the multiplex picks up in earnest once presents are unwrapped on Dec. 25.
Warners is dominating the year-end marquee. DC superhero pic Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom opens Dec. 22, followed by musical The Color Purple on Christmas Day. On the family front, Universal and Illumination’s original animated event pic Migration also comes out on Dec. 22.
The musical genre has a checkered history of late, but Wonka and The Color Purple hope to reverse that curse and match the success of films including the Hugh Jackman-led The Greatest Showman, which debuted to dismal numbers over Christmas in 2017 but then took hold and amassed a fortune.
Wonka is one of the first Hollywood pics to unspool since the SAG-AFTRA strike ended. Warners and the filmmakers breathed a huge sigh of relief at being able to dispatch Chalamet to promote and publicize the PG-rated film. Young girls are particularly taken with the young actor, who next stars in Dune: Part Two, which Warners and Legendary delayed until next March so that Chalamet and co-star Zendaya would be able to do press.
Lionsgate’s origin story The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes held at No. 2 in its fifth weekend as it jumped the $300 million globally after finishing Sunday with a domestic cume of $145.2 million and $155.3 million overseas for an impressive global tally of $300.5 million. Maybe there is a place for a new Hunger Games series.
Following at No. 3 was Japan’s anime sensation The Boy and the Heron, which earned another $5.2 million domestically and finished with a tally of $23.1 million. Japan’s monster pic is also in the top five, with Godzilla Minus One delivering another $4.5 million for a domestic tally of $44.3 million.
Thanksgiving leftovers Trolls Band Together and Wish followed with $4 million and $3.2 million, respectively.
Fathom/s faith-based Christmas with the Chosen: Holy Night earned a noteworthy impressive $2.9 million for an event offering.
At the awards box office, MGM/Amazon’s daring dramedy American Fiction reported a per-theater average of $32,411 from its first seven cinemas. The audience and critical darling, from writer-director Cord Jefferson, nabbed a handful of top Golden Globe nominations last week, including a spot in the race for best picture race for musical or comedy comedy and a best musical/comedy actor nom for star Jeffrey Wright. American Fiction earned five top Critics Choice Awards nominations.
Another high-profile specialty awards player, Yorgos Lanthimos’ Poor Things moved into the top 10 chart at the domestic box office as it expanded into a total of 82 cinemas and earned $1.3 million. Starring Emma Stone, Poor Things — which secured the third-best location average of the last weekend — boasts seven Golden Globe noms, including best musical/comedy picture and best musical/comedy, along with 13 Critics Choice noms.
Dec. 17, 10 a.m.: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated Wonka‘s global total. THR regrets the error.
This story was first published Dec. 16 at 8:11 a.m.
